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Castlemaine, VIC: Ancestral Spirits and Goldrush Relics


Castlemaine, which is located between the cities of Ballarat and Bendigo, is 120 kilometres northwest of Melbourne, Australia.


Dja Dja Wurrung Aboriginal People

The area of Castlemaine is part of Dja Dja Wurrung Aboriginal country.

Dja Dja Wurrung (Yes Yes tongue/speak) people who are part of the Kulin (Nation) appear to have consisted of sixteen or more clans with similar dialects.

The descent system of the Dja Dja Wurrung people is a patrilineal kinship system in which an individual's kin group, or clan membership, is traced through the male line. 

Bunjil the Wedge-tailed Eagle and Waa the Crow, are regarded as ancestral beings. Members of the community identified with one or the other of these moieties, which determined marriage between individuals. People had to marry someone from the opposite moiety.
Aboriginal people of Victoria, AUST, translated from Germann, circa 1867, British Library’s catalogue
In the belief system of the Dja Dja Wurrung people, laws and ceremonies were given to the people by Bunjil. The Giant Serpent, called Mindye, is the keeper and enforcer of Bunjil’s Law.

With the arrival of Europeans, the Dja Dja Wurrung lifestyle was fractured and by December 1852, the population of Dja Dja Wurrung people was estimated at about 142. The descendants of these people still live in the area today.

Evidence of the Aboriginal heritage of Castlemaine can be found in artefact scatters, earth mounds and scarred trees, which occur throughout the area. The natural features of this landscape hold social, cultural and spiritual significance to the Dja Dja Wurrung people.
Aboriginal women of Victoria, Australia, circa 1900, Aussie~mobs
Aboriginal ceremonial shields at The Melbourne Museum

1836

The expedition by Surveyor-General, Major Thomas Mitchell passed through the Castlemaine District in September 1836.

Pastoral settlement followed in 1837, with the first European settlers naming the area Forest Creek. However, as the population grew, it became known as Mount Alexander.

1850s

In the first week of July 1851, Victoria separated from New South Wales and was named after Queen Victoria.

On 20 July 1851, gold was found at Specimen Gully on Barkers Creek by Christopher Thomas Peters, a shepherd working for Dr William Barker on his Mount Alexander run. 

Thomas Peters however, threw the gold away after he was ridiculed for finding fool's gold (quartz and pyrite crystals).

Some of Barker's other employees, John Worley, George Robinson, Robert Keen, along with Peters, began panning in Specimen Gully, where Peters had found the gold. They kept their gold finds secret for nearly two months, while they dug as much gold as they could. 

Then, John Worley's wife offered some gold nuggets in payment for meat, and Dr Barker accused the men of trespass and sacked them. 

Worley wrote a letter to the Argus newspaper announcing the gold discovery. Within a month, there were about 8,000 diggers living in tents and protecting for gold in the area.
Mount Alexander gold diggings, Australia Sketched on the spot by R. S. Anderson Esqre, late of Edinburgh; lithographed by Mackay & Kirkwood, Glasgow. Glasgow Examiner, 1852
By December of that year, the population on the goldfields was more than that of Melbourne.

In 1852, the township of Castlemaine was surveyed, and in 1853, the first auction of the townsite was held.

Castlemaine was then officially named after Viscount Castlemaine, an Irishman, by his nephew, the goldfields commissioner.

The first Castlemaine Hospital was opened in Gingell Street on May 24, 1853.
Mount Alexander Mail (Vic. : 1854 - 1917), Friday 18 July 1856
By 1857, there were about 31,000 diggers at the nearby Mount Alexander goldfields, and the town of Castlemaine had become a boomtown, which dramatically expanded.
Diggings in the Mount Alexander VIC, in 1852, watercolour on paper, by ST Gill
Market Square, Castlemaine, Vic - 1850s, Aussie~mobs
Mount Alexander Mail (Vic. : 1854 - 1917), Wednesday 19 August 1857

The Military

The Commissioner's Camp, known as "The Camp", was established in 1852 to administer law and order on the Castlemaine goldfields. The building at 4 Camp Crescent was built, probably by 1854, as military officers' quarters in the Government Camp and first occupied by Captain Frederick Blyth, the Commandment of the Troops.

In 1858, following the 1854 Eureka uprising and the 1855 Act for Better Management of the Goldfields, the military forces were withdrawn from The Camp, and the house was taken over in 1859 by the Police Magistrate, Captain George Harrison.
The Commissioner's Camp, Castlemaine, in 1862 [picture] / lithographed & published by Edwd. Gilkes; from a sketch by Clarke Ismir
The former Castlemaine military quarters, 4 Camp Crescent, Castlemaine, VIC

Churches

In 1853, Mass was celebrated in Castlemaine in a stable at the back of the Prince of Wales Hotel, afterwards renamed the Commercial on Mostyn Street. The Commercial Hotel which first opened in 1854, provided accomodation to the Duke of Edinburgh, who stayed there in 1867. Opposite the hotel was the place that the Cob and Co. service drew up daily, with its six horses.

The foundation stone for Christ Church, Castlemaine, was laid on February 24th 1854, by Anglican Bishop Perry. The building was completed in 1858.
Old Castlemaine, VIC, Weekly Times (Melbourne, Vic. : 1869 - 1954), Saturday 22 September 1928
The Mount Alexander Mail began publication at Castlemaine in 1854.

The first Castlemaine cemetery was located in the area around Templeton Street. In December 1856, the bodies from the old cemetery were exhumed and re-interred at Campbell's Creek.

A visitor who walked along the main road from Castlemaine toward Campbells Creek in January 1856 noted changes to the settlement, which was almost four years old:

"Keeping on the main road, we pass John o’ Groats’ Hotel, a brick building, judging from appearances ... A little further on, on the right hand, stands the remains of the Shakespeare Hotel, now converted into a ginger beer manufactory’ ... On the opposite side of the creek is 70-foot Hill, and a number of others partially worked. ... We pass the Bath Arms, a neat little public house, on the left side, as all the other hotels are. Wheelers Brewery stands on the right hand side, on freehold land, and fenced.

Beyond that, is Ranters Gully with numerous tents pitched, very few diggers ... The Primitive Methodists are erecting a place of worship. Further on, a Cornishman has two large paddocks down, drained by a horse pump, and two puddling machines. There are 20 Chinese tents on the hillside above the Five Flags. Between the Five Flags and the Oddfellows, on the left stands the Presbyterian church, the most miserable wretched place of worship we have ever seen ... Arriving at the late Anglo-French hotel, we see signs of life once more."

Agitation Hill

The Eureka Stockade at nearby Ballarat was preceded by events which took place at Castlemaine on Agitation Hill in 1853. Grievances centred on unfair laws and policing of the miners' work. The Eureka Stockade rebellion would bring immense change to Australia. It was an important development in our democracy, rights and liberties.
The burning of Bentley's hotel in the Eureka Rebellion, VIC, 17 October 1854

Business and Communication
The famous businessman who established the store called Mark Foy's in Sydney, according to a newspaper report, owned a market stall in Castlemaine in 1853. (Weekly Times (Melbourne, Vic. : 1869 - 1954), Saturday 22 September 1928).

Electric Telegraph

First communication by telegraph was 1st January, 1857.
Ovens and Murray Advertiser (Beechworth, Vic. : 1855 - 1918), Saturday 14 August 1858
Mount Alexander Mail (Vic. : 1854 - 1917), Wednesday 14 December 1859

Recollections, Rev. E. A. Crawford 

In his recollections, Rev. E. A. Crawford wrote about how he arrived in Castlemaine with his family at the beginning of 1859, at the age of seven. He recounted that:

When we came to Castlemaine the
railway was open as far as Digger's
Rest. The rest of the journey, let
me rather say the remainder of the
journey (for there was not much of
rest in it), was accomplished in
Cobb's coach. Cobb's coach entered
Castlemaine, of course, by the Mel-
bourne road, and, nothing that has
taken place in the town has done
more to change its general appear-
ance than the placing of the rail-
way station where it is. It has
meant the gradual decline of what
was a most-flourishing part of the
original town— all that part near the
junction of Forest street and Urq-
uhart street, including Mostyn street.
I have heard it said that two
hotels in Mostyn street, Bignell's
and Maguire's, used to bank £1000

a week. 

"Where the Gardens now are the
creek meandered through the flat,
and there were wells, formerly minting
shafts, whence water was pumped
to be carried in water carts of
barrel formation and sold to those
whose supply from their roofs was at

any time insufficient."

The Chinese

The Chinese Immigration Act 1855 (Vic) limited the number of Chinese passengers on a vessel to one for every 10 tons and appointed protectors to regulate their activity and shield them from attacks.

In a report on the Chinese population in Victoria in 1868, there were 5 Chinese stores at Castlemaine, each employing three men; one butcher shop, one eating house and five opium shops. Five gambling houses, two barbershops, four fishmongers and three druggists. Eighty Chinese people altogether.

The Australian academic Benjamin Penny, has described the relationship between the Chinese and Europeans on the goldfields as one of two communities largely living separate lives, speaking different languages, eating different food, living in different places and worshipping different gods in different ways.
Chinese passengers inside and on top of coach, 1853.
By 1859 the Chinese community erected a building at Campbell's Creek, for performing their burial rites, and the burning tower which survives in the Chinese section maybe this structure. There also exists a collection of about 107 footstones in the Chinese section.

Australia’s First Known Female Voter: Mrs Fanny Finch

The story of Mrs fanny Finch is an interesting one, as she is not only a London-born businesswoman of African heritage, but she is also the first known woman to cast a vote in an Australian election, on 22 January 1856, at Castlemaine.

Although Victorian women did not gain the right to vote until 1908, Fanny Finch, the owner of a Lodging House, who paid rates, was able to cast her vote as the suffrage law, gave all "rate-paying persons" the right to vote and did not yet discriminate in regard to gender or race.

So Fanny cast her vote at the Hall of Castlemaine (now the Theatre Royal), but later that afternoon, her vote and those of other unknown women were disallowed. Read more here
The voting card belonging to Fanny Finch, from 1856 is on display at the Castlemaine Art Museum
The Mount Alexander Mail reported in 1859:
"Formerly the custom to bury all classes together, but the evil of this system is most visible when the Chinese visit their dead, especially twice a year, for the purpose of feeding the spirits of the departed. They were allowed, on these occasions, to light fires and crackers, burn candles and papers, and spread on the graves various kinds of food, from whole roasted pigs to boiled fowls and jam tarts, together with copious libations of brandy. Although they were mostly very orderly amongst themselves, great confusion was caused by men and boys attracted to the spot by their strange ceremonies. At present they can only perform their religious rites at the building erected on purpose on their own ground."
The Castlemaine Steam Flour Mill 

"Situated at the foot of Barker street near the Barkly Bridge, is a large three storied building originally designed for a flour mill, but used as a store by the late Cornish and Bruce. This edifice, with a considerable piece of ground attached has lately passed into 'the hands of Mr N; Fitzgerald the eminent brewer, who in conjunction with Mr. Newhman has resolved to supply what is deemed a great want in the colony, viz,,a first class distillery."

 (The Portland Guardian Fri 6 Oct 1876).

This three storey Georgian-style brick and stone structure, was built in 1856-57, with Thomas Shephard as the architect. The Melbourne Sandhurst railway line contractors Cornish and Bruce acquired the mill in 1859 as a railway foundry. 
Castlemaine Steam Flour Mill (former), VIC

1860s 
Photograph of Castlemaine, VIC, ca.1860, with Vivian and Co., Castlemaine Foundry and workers in foreground and hills in the distance. Libraries Australia
 Mostyn Street, Castlemaine, Victoria, Circa 1861
Castlemaine Hotel, Hargraves Street, Castlemaine, circa 1861, SLVIC
Castlemaine Gaol, VIC, showing large stone building enclosed by high wall and three watchtowers, circa 1861 

Robert O'Hara Burke

Robert O'Hara Burke, the superintendent of police in the Castlemaine district from 1858-60, was the leader of the Burke and Wills expedition: The first Europeans to cross Australia from south to north in 1860-1861.
This image is a sketch portrait of Robert O'Hara Burke, date unknown. Robert O'Hara Burke (better known as the one half of Burke and Wills) was an Irish police officer and explorer who embarked on and led an ill-fated south to north expedition from Melbourne, Victoria to the Gulf of Carpentaria. He died on a unknown date in 1861 at Coopers Creek.
The formation of the Wesleyan Mission in Castlemaine in 1868 to evangelise among the Chinese living on the Mount Alexander Goldfields was a rare attempt at engagement.

Rev Joseph Ah Lee, a Catholic priest of Chinese background, was stationed at Castlemaine from April 1868 to June 1869.
Most Chinese people lived at Campbells Creek, 4 km south of the centre of Castlemaine, on the flat below Wheeler's Brewery.
CASTLEMAINE. 
"Chinese Converts. — Yesterday (Sunday) evening
a very interesting ceremony was performed at the
Wesleyan chapel — namely, the receiving into the
Christian Church of five Chinese converts. The
edifice was densely crowded, and even additional
seats down the aisles hardly afforded the accommo
dation required, and the entrance was full of those
who were not fortunate enough to obtain seats. So
veral other Chinese were present. The names of the
converts are Lou Sap, aged 39 ; Lung Ah Tou, 35 ;
James Ken Yan, 23 ; Tan Ton Chet, 50 ; and Won
Ah Kin, 21 — all from the neighborhood of Canton.
The first-named had been a priest or joss-house

keeper........."
Leader (Melbourne, Vic. : 1862 - 1918, 1935), Saturday 9 April 1864

Many Languages

Words which described Castlemaine Market in 1862 convey how multicultural the Castlemaine area was at the time:

"What a mixed population you encounter as you elbow your way through the crowd! English, Scotch and Irish, of course; butthen Germans, Americans, Frenchmen, Italians, and the omnipresent Chinaman, the latter a most useful bee in the world".

Women Miners

In about 1869, Sarah Davenport wrote about her reminiscences of immigration and life in New South Wales and Victoria in the 1840s and fifties. Her handwritten account, which is full of interesting spelling and punctuation, is entitled "Scech of an emegrants Life in australia from Leiving England in the year of our Lord 1841." It is held in the collection of the State Library of Victoria.

Sarah tells of the journey to the Mount Alexander goldfields:

"we was four days traviling to Mount alexander at nights when we camped one of us had to watch the hors all night for thair was plenty of hors stealing as some of the partis that got drunk and neglected to take that precaution found to thair loss we arrived on November 5 we looked for a quiet place to camp and put up our tents and got ready to dig for goold."

Along with "another wife", Sarah, decided to try some fossicking of their own.

"we had not been thair maney days when me and another wife whent a looking around the hills we had each a knife and a tin plate to get goold in if we shold find anny ...i soon picked up a piece about a quarter of an ounce my youngest son came for the dinner and said they wold make two ounces or more 'tell father I will make three' for we had found a patch of surface we got a tub and pick and spade and washed one tub full we carried down to the creek to wash in a buket and washed it and finished in a tin dish [the] first tubful yealded about a 3 ounces the next 4 we was in high glee when both her husbands party and my husband and sons came and to work they went and so we had to give in but we had made 7 ounces it was fryday'".

William Howitt, who wrote a book called Land Labour and Gold in 1855, was amazed by the number of "diggeresses" on the goldfields when he arrived­. He wrote, "You see a good many women ... and some of them right handsome young girls. They all seem very cheerful and even merry, and the women seem to make themselves very much at home in this wild, nomadic life."
Mount Alexander Mail (Vic. : 1854 - 1917), Saturday 29 October 1864
Court House Castlemaine, VIC, circa 1865, SLVIC
1870s

In 1871 the census recorded a population of 6935.
Castlemaine, Victoria, Australia looking west along Forest Street circa 1870- 1875
Mrs Wheeler began the Castlemaine Representative newspaper in March 1870, which ran for several years. Another local newspaper was The Leader that was issued by 1888.

Castlemaine's Woollen Mill

Castlemaine's Woollen Mill dates back to 1875. At the 1883 Royal Commission on the Tariff, James Shaw, a director of the Castlemaine Woollen Mill, told the Royal Commission that the introduction of protection was the major reason for the establishment of the mill. 
Shaw called for a tariff increase on blankets and flannels and stated that the mill was unable to compete with English imports. Eli Roberts, Manager of the Mill, pointed out that labour costs were higher in Victoria than in England. (Humphrey McQueen, Social Sketches of Australia, 1888-1975)
Victorian Militia, probably Castlemaine Rifles, circa 1875, SLVIC
Barker Street, Castlemaine, VIC, circa 1875, SLVIC
Mount Alexander Mail (Vic. : 1854 - 1917), Tuesday 24 August 1880

Worked-Out
It is often said that he Castlemaine goldfield was the richest alluvial goldfield in the world, which is reflected in the grand buildings built in the early years of the town's establishment. However, the alluvial diggings were worked-out within 15-20 years.

1880s
Castlemaine Rock

By 1886, the gold was running out. Many miners drifted away to try their luck elsewhere. Castlemaine entered a new era of sheep, pig and cattle farming, timber production and wool milling. 
One important industry of the town is the production of the confectionery, Castlemaine Rock, which was first made and sold from a tent in the Mount Alexander diggings in 1853. This sweet is still made today using the original recipe by the Barnes family.
Barker St, Castlemaine in Victoria in the 1870s.Businesses includes *Oriental Bank (155) *D. Ross Saddler * Criterion Hall (161) *Tighe's Livery Stables *Beard's Criterion Hotel (165)
1890s

By 1891 the population was 4770.
Former Presbyterian Church, Castlemaine, VIC, built 1894
Castlemaine, VIC, Australian Town and Country Journal (Sydney, NSW : 1870 - 1907), Saturday 1 June 1895
CASTLEMAINE HOSPITAL, VIC in 1897.The first Castlemaine Hospital, VIC, was opened in Gingell Street on May 24, 1853. The Hospital provided essential medical and nursing care and, in 1939, was relocated to new buildings in Halford Street where it remained in service until December 22, 1995
Top, Cumberland Hotel, Castlemaine, VIC and bottom, Castlemaine Coffee Palace
1900s

X L Drapery Co, Castlemaine, Victoria - very early 1900s
X L Drapery Co, Castlemaine, Victoria - very early 1900s Kaye
Barker Street, Castlemaine, VIC,. Circa 1908
Castlemaine Woollen Mills, VIC, Leader (Melbourne, Vic. : 1862 - 1918, 1935), Saturday 17 December 1910
Gentlemen's Motoring Party Outside, Duggan's Livery Stables, Castlemaine, Victoria, circa 1911
Harrison's Cycle Depot in Castlemaine, Victoria - 1911, Aussie~mobs
Castlemaine high school was founded in 1910 and the technical school in 1916. 

WWI

SONS VOLUNTEER.
A FINE RECORD.
The Tatt family have nobly responded
to tho Empire's call. Of a family of 12 —
six sons and six daughters — the whole, of
the sons enlisted, and are by their early
training eminently fitted to endure the
hardships of a soldier's life. 
Bendigo Advertiser (Vic. : 1855 - 1918), Saturday 7 July 1917
One of the 6 sons of the Tatt family of Castlemaine, VIC, who volunteered  for WWI. Private George Tatt of Castlemaine, VIC

Castlemaine Foundry

 Castlemaine Progress Association, VIC, organisers of Castlemaine Past and Present Exhibition and who helped establish the Castlemaine Art Gallery and Historical Museum. Back Row left to right: Mr W J Whitchell, Mr F R Cocking, Mr A Pensom, Mr N Hayes, Miss M Leviny, Miss W Brotherton. Front Row left to right. Lieut. Col. F S Newell, Mrs Philpots, Mrs M B Woolley, Mrs A Newell, Mr Mapperson. (c.1910)
Castlemaine Foundry, VIC, established by Thompson
and Co., engineers. Leader (Melbourne, Vic. : 1862 - 1918, 1935), Saturday 17 December 1910

1920s

Castlemaine, Victoria, circa 1920, The Biggest Family Album in Australia
THE RAILWAY STATION CASTLEMAINE VIC. 1921, SLVIC
The North Castlemaine State School in Castlemaine, Victoria c 1925, give or take a year or two. Jack Tansey was a student at the time. HistoryInPhotos
Castlemaine woollen mill. ca. 1920 - ca. 1929] State Library VIC

1930s

CASTLEMAINE TEAM, VIC. (.Winners): — Back row, left to right: T. Lynch. N. Richards, S. Nicol, W. Gallaghan, E. Franklin, A. Strauch, N. McPherson, M. Burke, R.
Duff. Centre: N. Reeves, W. Pardon (Vice Capt.), R. J. Corbett (Capt.), J. Campbell, R. Bogie, T. Mounsey. Front: V. Delmenico. F. Douglas, C. Jones,L. Slingo. Weekly Times (Melbourne, Vic. : 1869 - 1954), Saturday 7 June 1930
Vera Fricke, her daughter Barbara and sister in law Hazel, Location probably the Castlemaine, Vic, Botanical Gardens, Two Pennies1

1940s and WWII

CORPORAL KILLED. Parents of Corporal John Dallas Grant, 27, of Castlemaine, VIC, have been notified that their son has been killed in action. ,Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 - 1957), Tuesday 21 January 1941
Rowe Motors at 48 Forrest St, Castlemaine, VIC, Matt W
Castlemaine welcomes service personnel, VIC, Weekly Times (Melbourne, Vic. : 1869 - 1954), Wednesday 31 July 1946

1950s

 VICTORIA'S GOVERNOR DECLARE CASTLEMAINE A TOWN, VIC, Weekly Times (Melbourne, Vic. : 1869 - 1954), Wednesday 8 February 1950,
Castlemaine swimming pool. "not after 1951", State Library Victoria Collections

1970s

Castlemaine, VIC, circa 1975 Matt W
Castlemaine, VIC, circa 1975 Matt W
Mostyn St, Castlemaine, VIC, from Hargraves St to Barker St, south side 1970
Photos SLV - Part of a photographic survey of Central Victoria undertaken by the Committee for Urban Action (Melbourne, Vic.) In collection: Committee for Urban Action photographic survey of Castlemaine, Victoria 1970-1974
St Marys Primary School - Urquart Street, Castlemaine, from Lyttleton Street to Campbell Street, west side. Photo taken 1972-75 for the Committee for Urban Action Castlemaine. In the State Library Vic collection
Templeton Street, Castlemaine, Victoria, from Barker Street to Kennedy Street, south side. Photo taken 1972-75 for the Committee for Urban Action Castlemaine. In the State Library Vic collection
Templeton Street, Castlemaine, VIC, cnr Barker Street, north side. Photo taken 1972-75 for the Committee for Urban Action Castlemaine. In the State Library Vic collection
CBC Bank - Barker Street, Castlemaine, VIC, from Forest Street to Mostyn Street, west side 1972-75. Photo taken for the Committee for Urban Action Castlemaine; in the State Library Vic collection
Barker Street, Castlemaine, VIC. Photo taken 1972-75 for the Committee for Urban Action Castlemaine; in the State Library Vic collection

1980s

Castlemaine, VIC, circa 1981, Matt W
Castlemaine, VIC, circa 1981, Matt W
Today, Castlemaine is a town of immense heritage value, which showcases many relics of the Victorian gold rush.


Around Castlemaine


Victorian building Castlemaine, VIC
St Mary's Hall in Castlemaine, Victoria
Former Beck's Imperial Hotel Castlemaine, VIC. Built 1861
Castlemaine Town Hall, VIC
The Castlemaine Post Office was built in 1874-5, VIC
Globe  Hotel Castlemaine, VIC, built 1853
This photo of Old Castlemaine Gaol is courtesy of TripAdvisor, Castlemaine, Vic
Midland Hotel, Castlemaine, VIC. History
The beautiful Art Deco, Castlemaine Museum, VIC. Building dating from 1931
The Empyre, formerly known as the Albion, was built in 1860,
Castlemaine Railway Platform opened on 21 October 1862, Castlemaine VIC
The original Theatre Royal, Castlemaine built in 1854. This Royal Theatre was constructed in 1938
Heritage building in Castlemaine
Steam train at Castlemaine Train Station, VIC
Old sandstone Telegraph station from 1857, Castlemaine, VIC
George Clark and Son, part of Thompson's Foundry inside the Castlemaine market Building, Castlemaine, VIC
Sandstone telegraph station of 1857, the north wing demolished in 1893 and one wall of the remainder incorporated in the Faulder Watson Hall
Verey's photographic studio located here in 1884, Castlemaine, VIC
Mechanics Institute opened in 1857, now library, Castlemaine, VIC
Castlemaine Fire Staion built 1906 and Castlemaine Volunteer Fire Brigade, VIC
Weather-board circa 1860 Trades Hall, Castlemaine, VIC
Castlemaine Drill Hall, VIC, was constructed in Lyttleton Street in 1888-9 after a decision was made to demolish the existing orderly room. In 1863 a site within the Public Purposes Reserve was gazetted for the use of the Castlemaine Rifle Corps, and in 1872 a brick orderly room was built.
Commercial Hotel was built 1857 as Butterworth's Store. It became the Commercial Hotel in 1874, Castlemaine, VIC
Built as a Congregational Church at Castlemaine, VIC, in 1861 in front of an earlier 1855 church. Now Presbyterian Church
The foundation stone for Christ Church, Castlemaine, VIC, was laid on February 24th 1854 by Anglican Bishop Perry but it was not completed until 1858



Things To Do and Places To Go


Castlemaine Historical Walks

Buda Historic Home and Garden



Books To Read 

The Castlemaine Murders (Phryne Fisher, #13)
by Kerry Greenwood

Judicial Murder The Crown vs David Young
by Deborah Benson